No evidence Moscow helped Snowden - senator

ReutersFBI Director Robert Mueller (left) meets with senators Pat Leahy and Dianne Feinstein before an oversight hearing about the FBI on Capitol Hill in Washington in 2013. File picture: Larry Downing

Washington - The chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Dianne Feinstein, said on Tuesday she has seen no evidence that Russian spies helped former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden steal US eavesdropping secrets.

The Democrat's comments on the MSNBC TV channel contrast with statements by her Republican counterpart in the House of Representatives’ Intelligence Committee, Mike Rogers.

Rogers suggested earlier this month that Russia had acquired influence over Snowden before he left his job as a contractor and travelled to Hong Kong, where he leaked tens of thousands of classified documents describing US and British eavesdropping operations.

“I have no information to that effect. I've never seen anything to that effect. I've asked some questions since and nothing has been forthcoming,” Feinstein said.

A senior US official familiar with the matter said that he had seen no evidence Snowden had been recruited or influenced by Russia to acquire and leak US eavesdropping secrets. Other US security officials have privately offered similar assessments in recent weeks.

Rogers said on television 10 days ago that Snowden had likely been collaborating with Russia before he fled there last year.

“Let me just say this. I believe there's a reason he ended up in the hands, the loving arms, of an FSB agent in Moscow,” Rogers said, referring to Russia's intelligence service.

Rogers described Snowden as a “thief who we believe had some help”.

Rogers' spokesperson, Susan Phalen, said on Tuesday that the House Intelligence Committee chairman stood by his earlier statement.

Earlier this month, in what was described as an interview conducted by encrypted means from Moscow, the New Yorker website quoted Snowden as denying claims that he had earlier spied for Russia.

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